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Re "Betrayal"; yes, someone's posted it (for the time-being at any rate) here:
For me it's all a bit after-the-fact now, but for what it's worth, I don't think Jose ever said anything without understanding exactly what his words meant. The 'bad apples' quote (5Live last night) bears this out.

^ Not sure this talk of bringing in assistant coaches is going to get to the nub of the problem. Jose seems completely blinkered to any serious change of philosophy this season and he doesn't strike me as the sort of person open to the ideas of others either. More of a 'my way or the highway' sort of guy. And anyway, we're more than just a few tactical tweaks away from being back to where we were the first half of last season. The changes required are root and branch, not mere tinkering. And it may be that only a change of manager can deliver that.

This from today's Telegraph on Adebayor: Adebayor saw a loan move to West Ham blocked by Levy in the last January window and held negotiations with the club over the summer, when he was told he would be required to have eight weeks of training under his belt to be seriously considered in the New Year. Having stayed in Togo until December, Adebayor is already a full month behind the schedule the Hammers set him and attempts to convince clubs that he has been working hard on his fitness are at odds with a series of pictures posted on Instagram showing him relaxing and posing with cars. There have been questions raised over whether or not Adebayor still has the hunger and desire to play top-flight football, following a summer saga of failed moves and the revelation that he is still being paid in full by Tottenham. In other words, my answer on getting him involve the words "wouldn't", "touch" and " bargepole"... http://www.telegraph.co.uk/sport/football/teams/tottenham-hotspur/12029534/Emmanuel-Adebayors-Premier-League-return-complicated-by-Tottenham-still-paying-his-wages.html

'Seems a bit unfair to put it that way; if his development has slowed down surely that is, to a significant degree, due to the limits of what you can achieve playing in youth and u21 games. Like so many before him, he needs to play more competitive football. And as for your 10% figure, I appreciate you are volunteering the view of an optimist as opposed to your own, but the realist's retort would be that probably fewer than that amount will have any sort of adult career at all in professional football, never mind in the top flight.

All of the plans and documents that accompanied the Planning Application can be found on the LBHF website, here: http://www.lbhf.gov.uk/Directory/Environment_and_Planning/Regeneration/Regeneration_projects/198181_Stamford_Bridge_Grounds_planning_application.asp There's a link to all of the drawings and other documents on that page (they seem to take a while to open, probably a few curious eyes giving them the once-over after the Mail's piece today). Tons there for those who are so inclined to look; this is quite a good one though', with two cross-sections through the existing and proposed stadia. (E-W and N-S) http://public-access.lbhf.gov.uk/online-applications/files/D03B462F143BD0686B0C86AB5705803F/pdf/2015_05050_FUL-LONG_SECTIONS_-_EXISTING___PROPOSED-1562804.pdf (opens a pdf file) It shows - how the pitch level will be lower than existing. - a better idea of how the East stand will span the railway line - gives some idea of which areas will be for hospitality, versus "general admission" (see the colour coding) Exciting times!

Slightly off topic but as the forum seems dead as a door nail at the moment I thought I'd stick it in. On the back of Jesse Lingard and Paul Pogba's appearance in last night's International Friendly, Sky Sports today ran a "Where Are They Now" piece on the other members of the 2011 FA Youth Cup team they both appeared in. http://www.skysports.com/football/news/15115/10070275/manchester-uniteds-2011-fa-youth-cup-final-winning-team-where-are-they-now You may recall that they beat us in the Semi Final, when our team, by comparison, was Blackman - Kane - Kalas - N Chalobah - Deen-Conteh - Saville - Devyne - Ince - Lalkovic - MacEachran - Nditi

^For me, the starting point to the 'modernisation' of football was Italia 90... Nessun Dorma, that nice young Gary Lineker playing, Gazza's tears, 'housewife's choice' Des Lynam at the helm... That was the first time I can remember non-football fans taking an interest in football. How ironic that it was on the back of a reasonably successful England World Cup campaign? You could say that one of the outcomes was the demise of the national team along with few people giving a t055 about it compared to their club's fortunes. That was at the time of lads' mags, 'ladettes', Badiel and Skinner's Fantasy Football - in some ways football was the right 'product' at the right place at the right time. I DO blame Sky to a significant extent; but when you look at the TV revenues earned by PL clubs today, a huge chunk of that is for overseas rights and that's nothing to do with Sky (or not Sky in the UK at any rate). However, Sky identified that football was the one piece of content (sorry, 'hate that word too) that fan loyalty meant people would pay to subscribe to - and they've been squeezing fans til the pips squeak ever since.

^Interesting comments on Martin Tyler, above. I think his commentary has really gone downhill of late, to the extent that he's fast becoming something of a parody of himself. There's an art to striking a balance between describing the action while not simply stating what's obvious because you can see it for yourself. Instead he seems to either make cheap point-scoring comments, or go in search of clever 'do you see what I did there' puns and word plays. Sky's coverage is radically different to when they started in the 90s, perhaps Tyler should have gone the same way as Andy Gray.

^^ You have to consider a past player's track record, and his comments on a range of teams, in order to appraise fairly his punditry. For Phil Neville, however, a more simple rule applies: if his lips are moving, he's talking sh*t.

Great film, that. Where he's telling Billy Bremner to behave in the Charity Shield IIRC that was the game where he had a full-on punch up with Kevin Keegan!! The beautiful game it most certainly wasn't!

God I hate Stoke! Horrible, negative team whose only style of play is to kick the opposition off the park and try and nick wins by launching long balls in the last ten minutes to the human beanpole. They could easily have been down to nine men had the ref been giving yellows out to the letter of the law. Ok so they may play some nice football at times, but yesterday was a complete reversion to type. Oh, and a word to Stoke's away support with their stupid song: the FSF campaign "Twenty's Plenty" refers to ticket prices, not the number of fans you should take to an away game. Then, to cap it all, Charlie Adam, who could have been red carded for that elbow on Fabregas, scores a worldy! Did you see Carra's tweet on it yesterday? @Carra23: Charlie Adam!!!!! He tried that shot from the halfway line 3 times a game at Lfc about bloody time! Seems the one trick pony finally pulled it off! Stoke. The new Coventry City. Never win anything. Exist only to bugger it up for everyone else. Rant over...